18 Candidates File for Elections in Inglewood

The spring political campaign got under way in Inglewood Thursday with 18 candidates filing for six elected positions, three on the City Council and three on the Inglewood Unified School District Board.

Two-term council incumbents Anthony Scardenzan and Daniel Tabor are both facing multiple challengers in the April election, while the vacant seat of the late Councilwoman Ann Wilk has drawn a crowd of five hopefuls.

In the school district race, on the other hand, only 12-year board veteran Caroline Coleman appears to face much competition. Board member Larry Aubry will face only one challenger, while board member Joseph Rouzan is running unopposed. Aubry and Rouzan were elected last year to fill remaining time left for vacant board seats.

In council District 1, which encompasses the eastern part of Inglewood, Councilman Tabor, 34, is seeking his third term. He is a project coordinator for United Way. Also filing by Thursday’s 5 p.m. deadline were John Gibbs, 32, son-in-law and former legislative aide to the late Assemblyman Curtis Tucker (D-Inglewood); former councilman Andrew Isaacs, 66, a retired county health official who lost his seat to Tabor in 1981, and Tyrone Smith, a salesman and real estate agent.

In council District 2, Councilman Scardenzan, a 60-year-old businessman, is also seeking a third term. He will face Mark Ganier, 53, a maintenance supervisor for Inglewood schools, and Daniel Langston, who could not be reached for more information. The district encompasses the northern part of the city.

In the District 3, encompassing western and downtown Inglewood, five candidates are seeking to serve the remaining two years in the term of Wilk, who was elected in 1987 and died of a heart attack in December. The candidates include former Councilman Bruce Smith, 68, a businessman who lost his seat to Wilk; Claude Lataillade, 37, a TRW engineer who ran unsuccessfully in the 1987 election; Jose Fernandez, 29, a businessman and aide to State Sen. Cecil Greene (D-Santa Fe Springs); Muhammed Nasardeen, a former director of security for Centinela Medical Center who now runs a consulting firm, and Robert Sturms, 18, a student at Inglewood High School.

In the school district, the five-member board is elected at-large, though the seats are separately contested.

Three challengers are seeking to oust Coleman, 51, a Los Angeles County probation officer who was appointed to the board in 1977 and is seeking to win election for a third time. They are Jewett Walker, 38, an insurance underwriter who ran unsuccessfully against board member Rouzan in November; Thomasina Reed, 40, an attorney, and Emmanuel Gary, 42, a school district athletic coach.

Aubry, 55, was elected in June to fill the term of former board member Ernest Shaw, who died in 1987. Aubry, a Los Angeles County human relations consultant, will face community activist Mildred McNair, 47.

Rouzan, 56, a criminal justice consultant and the city’s former police chief, is running unopposed. He was elected in November to fill the unexpired term of former board member Rosemary Benjamin, who resigned last February.